Posts Tagged ‘Solstice’

Tom Carter was an opportunist. Some months ago, Jacob Wilson, self-styled patriarch of the Montreal metahuman mafia had hired him as muscle in a deal with an ambitious, rapidly growing gang of metas. The bartering collateral in question was a piece of technology that would revolutionize meta warfare. Powers were always an interesting element in a meta mob war, especially since no one really wanted the general population to know who had powers and who didn’t. Tom wasn’t a meta. He had no investment in the meta community’s continued existence, except that some of them happened to pay his exorbitant fees.

Some tinkerer from this new meta gang had invented a small device the size of one’s thumb that would instantly nullify a target’s powers. There was some risk involved–one wrong move, and both parties would find themselves temporarily without their special abilities. Still, a number of these devices in the right hands could change the outcome of the war.

And it was something Solstice would pay dearly for.

The Jacob Wilson had no intention of such a thing falling into Solstice hands, and of course he had no love for his opposition. With metas inexplicably on the rise in the last decade, a few had joined forces with more than one rival mob family. The man didn’t have powers himself, but his boys and his precious little princess had been born with meta abilities. Jacob didn’t want to see his family put in harms way.

Tom, on the other hand, would sell his own grandmother if it would make him a buck.

He appeared to be a nice enough fellow, if not a bit gruff. He was ugly and snarling, but the heart of gold underneath all that was a double bluff. He gave exactly zero fucks about anyone but himself. With the old Jacob dead, Tom was the only person who knew the technology existed, save for leadership of the splinter group. A bit of money in the right hands, and that gang was eliminated, narrowing even further the list of people aware of the tech.

With the death of Jacob Wilson, it was time to make some real money. Solstice had unbelievable connections, and they were willing to do anything to get them a leg up in what they considered to be a crucial war for the sake of mankind. Metas, as far as they were concerned, were a diseased form of humanity that had to be purged before they plunged the whole world into entropy. It was all a bit high-minded, but as far as he was concerned, they could believe in a goddamned fish Jesus if it meant they’d pay him for bait and tackle.

Lyndria’s club was busy. Tom threaded his way through partiers gyrating to the music under a canopy of smoke and light shows. Lyndria was wasted. A man of greater conscience would be troubled by stealing from her a device that threatened her very existence when the girl was dealing with the death of her whole family, but it was this death that gave Tom the opportunity. He wasn’t about to pass it off.

Once in the old man’s study, he opened the safe with the combination that he’d long since memorized. He might have been surprised that Lyndria hadn’t changed it, but the girl didn’t have two brain cells to rub together. Prototype acquired, he walked downstairs with his small cargo centered in the palm of his hand. He looked across the crowded room and gave a subtle nod to a man dressed in khaki pants and a fitted, long-sleeve black shirt. He had a close-shaved beard, with the rest of his face shrouded by the fedora he wore. A subtle tip of the hat was the non-verbal agreement Tom was looking for.

Lyndria deserved to be stolen from. She was so far gone now, Tom was certain she had no capabilities of noticing this deal going down under her own nose in her own club. Tom allowed himself a small smirk.

Something made him glance over to the door. For a reason he couldn’t adequately explain, his attention was arrested by three people that joined the undulating crowd. One was a kid, barely of age, with brown hair and a leather jacket over a red t-shirt and jeans. Two were older men; one of them Asian, the other with a shock of flaming red hair. Tom shook his head. They were inconsequential. As he glanced away, he vaguely beheld them make their way to Lyndria. Maybe the kid was looking to lose his virginity. He wouldn’t be the first dumb cluck to hit up the easiest chick in the country.

Whatever their reason, it had nothing to do with him. Tom made his way to the man at the bar.

* * * *

Allen’s heart sat in his throat. He was so nervous, he couldn’t rightly tell if his palms were sweaty from the humidity or the fact that even his paragon endurance was put to the test with his excessive heart rate. He wiped them on his jeans. That didn’t help.

He spotted Lindsay the second they walked in. She hadn’t changed a lot, though she’d traded her simple trendy outfit to something that involved more leather and buckles. For some reason he half expected an emo makeup on her, though she didn’t seem given to that cliche. He took a breath and walked forward. The plan was for the older men to engage this Lyndria person with questions about her family, but that wasn’t Allen’s main concern. Their conversation would free him up to talk to Lindsay. Donald was sure that the Wilson’s family’s disappearance was somehow connected to the shit that had been going on with Delta, and Allen couldn’t come up with a reason for why that wasn’t so; still he was singular-minded in his objective. Lindsay was the one person in this situation who mattered to him.

He weaved his way through the crowd until he stood by her. She didn’t notice until he spoke. “Hey, Lindsay.”

She nearly hit the roof. “Allen! What the hell? What are you doing here?”

Allen shrugged and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “Looking for you.” It sounded cliche, like wooden dialog from a movie he and Tracy would watch together in a bad movie marathon.

Lindsay wasn’t helping. She crossed her arms and looked away. “Well, you found me. Now you can turn around and just walk away.”

Allen sighed. “Lindsay…don’t be like that. Look, do you know what you left behind?”

She said nothing, refusing to make eye contact.

“Marcus is–”

“Don’t. Okay? I don’t…I don’t want to know.”

“Why not? Lindsay, he loves you!”

“Don’t you think I know that? God, he–” She glanced at Allen, and her eyes glistened with tears in the flashing purple and blue lights. “Just go. Okay? I just…I need some space.”

“A whole country of space? God damn it, Lindsay! This isn’t–”

“This isn’t what? What a hero is supposed to do?”

“No, it’s not. It’s not what a hero would do.”

She looked at him, and her eyes seemed sad. “That’s fine then. Allen…I’m not a hero.”

“Yes, Lindsay, you are. Okay, I know we never really got along that well, but you’re a hero because Stryker said–”

“Don’t you dare speak his name!”

Allen stepped back, startled by the vehemence with which she spat the words at him. For a moment, he was angry. He took a deep breath as the anger welled inside him, choking him like someone had just shoved a fist down his throat. “Linsday, I have had enough of your shit! You have no right to tell me what I should and shouldn’t feel, and right now I am hurting because I lost someone I care about, and you can’t say I’m not allowed to feel broken. Furthermore, I’ve got a best friend who’s in pieces because his girlfriend abandoned him. I can’t fix the first one, but I am not going to stand by and let the second one slide. I will do everything I can to help him because that’s what friends do!”

Lindsay opened her mouth and shut it again, which was just as well, because Allen wasn’t done talking.

“Do you honestly have any idea what you’ve gotten yourself into? Stryker trained you to be a hero, but you’re not acting like it. I know you’re in pain. I know that sometimes you just gotta do stupid things, but this? Do you even know?”

He glanced around. The girl Lindsay had been with had now vanished. For the life of him, Allen couldn’t remember what she looked like, and he certainly couldn’t pick her out of a crowd this size. But she wasn’t there, and that was the important thing to drop this bombshell. “Your boss, the girl you’ve been guarding? Do you actually know who she is? She’s Lyndria Wilson. Of the mafia family.”

Lindsay’s eyes went wide. Then it was her turn to get angry. “You know what? Fuck you. You come in here being all high and mighty, fucking mister perfect telling me how to live my life–”

“I’m not–”

“No! You’re not! You’re not perfect so stop fucking acting like it! You tell me that I have no right to tell you how to feel, well how about taking some of your own goddamn advice. You don’t have the right either to tell me how to live my life.”

“So you’re just going to throw away everything you’ve been taught? Lindsay, don’t you see? When you’re with her–maybe you’re right. When you’re with her you’re not a hero, or at least not acting like it. You’re acting like a villain.”

The words leaped from his mouth before he could stop them. Her eyes widened, and he wanted more than anything to stuff them back into his mouth. She looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Well, maybe I am.”

Allen sighed. “No, Lindsay, you’re not, forget I said that. I’m sorry. But that doesn’t change one simple fact. This?” He waved his arm across the floor. “This is not what Stryker would have wanted.”

Nothing prepared him for the fist that flew in his face. With a loud crack, Lindsay’s fist sailed across his face. His neck jerked back, and he stumbled. The copper taste of blood coated his teeth. “Now I’ve had enough,” she snarled. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”

Allen’s fists clenched at his side. “I’m a hero. I’m Stryker’s protege, and though I always believe that title could be shared by both of us, clearly I was wrong!” He smirked. “I guess if you’re going to throw the first punch, that means there’s only one thing left to do.” He rose into the air. “I’m going to show you how a hero fights. How Stryker showed me to fight!”

He dashed toward her, but she slipped to the side. Allen noticed just in time to correct his course, though his countering punch lost a lot of its force. His fist slammed into her shoulder, and she rolled with it, unharmed. She brought her leg up to knee him in the kidneys, and he jerked his arm downward to block her with his elbow. His funny bone tingled as he slammed into her kneecap, following through with a right cross to her face. It landed with a smack. Color leaped to her cheek.

She pushed him away and picked up a lamp stand. With a feral scream, she broke it against his back as he turned to grab the nearby couch.

People screamed and scattered, which was just as well. They were going to have it out, that much was certain. The only question was, how much collateral damage was there going to be?

Allen didn’t care. So long as there were no people inside, he would level the whole goddamn club if it meant he could convince Lindsay to come home. To come to terms with the loss they shared. Donald and Liam cleared the area, though a few stayed to watch. This was the most exciting thing to happen in their lives, and they weren’t going to miss it.

It occurred to Allen that he was giving them a show. Every person that stayed behind had their phones out, and this was going to go up on the Internet right beside the video of his table throw in his high school cafeteria. That should have made him uncomfortable, but he was so far past caring. He flung the couch. “I will win this fight, Lindsay. Then we’ll see who’s really ready to carry on Stryker’s legacy!”

Sunlight drifted through the slits in the closed blinds over the picture window of Eric Herrington’s three-and-a-half storey house. Normally the window showed a mile-long stretch of beach that ended in the lake that stretched out for miles; but when one was on a bender, one didn’t care about those things so much as keeping the sun out.

The filtered rays danced over dozens of empty whiskey bottles and glasses that gathered with pizza boxes and Chinese food containers. Eric hadn’t left the house in days, and it showed.

The persistent ring of the telephone tugged Eric out of a passed-out drunken sleep. He decided to let it go to voicemail. It wasn’t worth the energy to fully pull himself from unconsciousness. He didn’t even move from his prone position on the couch, face half buried in the satin pillow.

The machine clicked and beeped, indicating the caller should leave a message. “Eric.” Charity. More than a month since they’d broken up, and her voice still made his heart beat faster. “Eric, I heard what happened to your brother. I just…. I wanted to say I’m sorry. For everything.”

Everything? The lies, the secrets, breaking his heart? He could still hear her words. You’re right…you need someone who can be honest with you. You deserve that much. And right now, that’s not me.

He wasn’t angry. He was too tired to be angry. Too tired from trying to figure it all out. She’d been different after her impromptu trip to Europe with her best friend Meryl last summer. A trip, which he later found out, she never actually took. She’d described an adorable cafe in Brussles, but Eric knew a friend of a friend who owned the place. He’d never seen her. That wouldn’t have been a big deal except that an art gallery she’d allegedly gone to had been closed for two years. And a small town she and Meryl had spent the night in was closed to tourism.

Not that she’d been anywhere in Alliance City. It was like she’d disappeared off the face of the Earth.

Since that summer, she’d been distant. The last few weeks of their relationship had been a painful game of telephone tag, and when they did finally manage some quality time, she was forever leaving their dates for a laundry list of poor excuses. When he finally cornered her and asked for a straight answer, that’s when she ended it.

Of course, it never rains, but it pours. He’d barely managed to pick himself off his drunk ass, and he received a call from Italy asking him to identify the body of his brother. The bile still rose in his throat when he thought of it. Drew’s body had been torn in two. An accident at his brother’s archeology site, Eric was told. A stone structure had collapsed on top of him, severing his torso. Looked more like something ripped it. He buried that thought. That was ridiculous. What would have the force to do that? He wasn’t a child to believe in monsters. Besides, he was no coroner.

More than ever, he wanted Charity there. She’d know what to say. Which would probably mean saying nothing. She’d just hold him and for a moment the world and its pain wouldn’t exist while they embraced.

But that was nothing more than a dream. They were over. He’d eventually pick himself up and go back to his white collar world. She’d hide in her books and relative obscurity, a handful of middleclass friends her only connection to the outside world. They’d traveled in different social circles before, and they would again. Her life would continue to be a mystery to him; the only consolation was that his would be just as hidden from her behind a wall of privilege.

His eyes opened. There was no way she could have heard about Drew’s death. His mother had gone to great lengths to keep it out of the media, and she certainly wouldn’t have told Charity. Elmira Herrington had entirely disapproved of Eric’s choice of partner.

How the hell did she know?

* * * *

Charity London fussed with the cuff of her Delta-issued flak jacket as her eyes darted back and forth from one screen to another. Drake Hachirobei watched her restlessness with typical quiet repose. They were in what appeared to be a derelict old van cinderblocked on the side of the road. On the outside, it was falling apart and pieces seemed to be missing as if the vehicle had been ravaged for parts. Inside, it was a technological marvel with several screens hooked up to hidden cameras showing different angles of the shady alleyway.

“I shouldn’t have called him.” For the umpteenth time that night, Charity was second-guessing herself. Drake said nothing. He’d given the obligatory platitudes already, including flat-out telling her that she needed to get over it. She hadn’t punched him in the face, but that was because he was right.

“I know what he’s feeling right now. His world’s upside down, and he doesn’t even know the real reason why. The last thing he wants is to hear from the girl who dumped him. I mean, who the hell falls for this kind of thing anyway?”

The abrupt change of subject mid-rant would have caught anyone else off guard, but Drake and Charity had been working together for so long that it would have taken a lot more than that to shake him.

“Apparently…” Drake flicked at the screen on his tablet. “Veto_Boi738.”

“Did we ever confirm that he is, indeed, a boy?”

“That’s about the only thing. The messages between him and the Solstice catfish were so garbled we don’t even know the kid’s powers.”

“Well, we do know Solstice wants to kill him, and that’s the important thing. I mean, growing up a freak is bad enough, but a bunch of people wanting to kill you because your DNA is a bit scrambled? I think Eric would understand, though. You know, if I told him.” She was on that again.

Drake just gave her a quirked eyebrow look.

“I know, I know. It would be treason and all that yadda yadda. Sam should have approved the relationship. That’s what pisses me off the most, that my love life is somehow my boss’s business.”

Drake could have told her that of course it was Samantha Clive’s business. The Delta Division’s very existence was classified, and in order to maintain that secrecy, Director Clive needed to be very careful about who they read in on protocol. But honestly, he didn’t really believe that, and most of the time he was of the opinion that protocol could go fuck itself.

“Oh, look, a drug deal.” Charity thrust her chin forward to point out two kids not-so-discretely exchanging money and a small package.

“Lucky for them, that’s not our department.”

“Nope, but that is.” She pointed at two men and a woman standing together outside the doorway of a seedy cafe. Their stances revealed them clearly to be combat trained, for someone who knew how to look. “I guess if a kid’s stupid enough to fall for the ‘we have candy, get in the van’ trick, there’s no need to be subtle.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, we’re the ones with the creepy van.”

“You know what I mean.”

A teenage boy in a hooded sweatshirt rounded the corner and took a quick look around, a little lost. Drake wiggled his eyebrows at Charity. “Show time.”

The three combatants, unaware of Charity and Drake’s presence, surrounded the boy and brandished weapons that looked like guns. “Nope,” Drake muttered. The guns crumbled in their hands and they looked up in surprise. Their shock wasn’t nearly as profound as the boy’s. He stood, stunned, too afraid to run or even move.

One of the men and the women took a combat stance flanking Drake. The other man and Charity squared off.

“Charity?”

* * * *

The boy’s voice was familiar. Charity glanced over her shoulder and peered under the hood. Her jaw dropped. “Marcus?” The reality thudded into Charity. Her brother, her kid brother was the one they were supposed to be protecting.

Which meant he’d developed powers.

Why hadn’t she seen it? What the hell was wrong with her? She been so damn preoccupied with her boyfriend drama, she’d missed a very real threat to her brother. She was supposed to be taking care of him.

Her focus shifted, her opponent took his chance. He struck out with a swift jab. Charity glanced back at the last minute to deflect the blow, but her hesitation cost her the chance to react to the assailant’s follow-through. A ceramic blade. Drake’s gonna be pissed that he didn’t see it coming, though that’s a smart move on Solstice’s part. Why her brain chose to focus on that detail in the half-second before it ran threw her, she had no idea. Hot and cold blended together as the knife sank into her stomach.

Her heartbeat became the only sound she was aware of on a conscious level. Marcus was screaming, something wordless. Poor kid. He was probably so confused. Drake had a look on his face that was as close to panic as he was capable of making. Her knees hit the ground.

The air tingled with electricity, which made no sense because she wasn’t discharging her power, at least not on purpose. And she’d gone well past the point where she was accidentally filling the environment with energy.

Marcus hadn’t. He was losing control. She wanted to tell him to calm down, that it was going to be okay, but she couldn’t say anything. Breathing hurt. The knife must have hit a lung.

“Get down!” Drake yelled, which made no sense because she was already on the ground. She was suddenly aware of the asphalt burrowing into her cheekbones. Put pressure on the wound she reminded herself. Now if only she could move to do so.

Everything went dark, and for a second she thought she’d passed out, but then she realized that the lights had gone out everywhere. Then Marcus was kneeling beside her. As she rolled over, she saw Drake out cold on the ground. “Pocket. Phone,” she managed. “Call Jay.” At least she hoped she said that. If he was going to go with the reasonable thing to do and call 911 they were all going to be in a bit of trouble.

The phone slipped from her pocket, so at least he got that part. “Jay? Who, what? Why?” She wished he’d shut up with his questions and do it already.

“Trust…me.” Her breath caught, and she coughed. She could taste the blood coating her mouth. Now the world really did go black.

* * * *

Marcus’ hands shook. He opened the phone. He was surprised it still worked. Every piece of electronic equipment for miles was knocked out. Why did this phone still work?

That didn’t matter. He paged through the contacts and found Jayson. That must be it. He dialed. The phone rang twice, and a male voice answered on the other end. “Jayson? Charity. She’s… She’s in trouble.”

And then there was someone there in the alley. “Damn good thing you had the sense to call me first,” Jayson said. Marcus gaped at him. “I teleport. You’ve got powers of some kind, so others with them shouldn’t surprise you.” He knelt calmly beside Charity.

A loud groan emanated from Drake. “Anyone get the number of that bus?” Marcus turned his stunned look at him, then at the others who’d attacked him. The three enemies were dead. More than that, they were barely charred remains. Marcus tasted bile in his mouth. I killed them.

He looked back at Drake. “How are you…Why aren’t you…”

“Dead? I affect magnetic fields. You caught me off guard, though. You get one shot at me, kid, and that was it. Don’t think it’ll happen again.”

Marcus didn’t know how to respond to that. No Sir? Bring it on, Sir? He had to have the ‘Sir’ in there, that’s for sure.

“Teleporting to the infirmary,” Jay said. He looked at Marcus. “Marcus, right? This is going to be a bit disorienting.”

He wasn’t kidding. The dark alleyway swirled into a mess of shadows in front of his eyes and resolved itself into blinding light. It took a second for his eyes to adjust, and longer for his stomach. Somehow he found a wastepaper basket before he lost his dinner.

There were nurses and doctors waiting, and Charity was loaded onto a gurney. She grabbed Jay’s hand. “You gotta tell him…if I don’t…”

“Don’t be silly, Charity, it’s not fatal, you’ll be fine.”

“Humor me.”

“You just get better and tell him yourself.” Jay waved his hand and the professionals wheeled her away.

Jay’s brow was furrowed with worry, but it cleared into a forced smile when he looked at Marcus. “So, uh…some welcome, hey, kid?” He stuck out his hand. “I’m Jayson.”

Jayson grabbed some paper towel and handed them to Marcus, who accepted them and wiped the upchucked leftovers from his mouth.

Questions and confusion swirled together in Marcus’ mind. He tried desperately to pull them into something that resembled order, but all that came out was an inarticulate expression of exasperation. “What the f—“

“So, let’s start from the beginning.” He indicated a set of chairs and waited for Marcus to take a seat. It wasn’t until he sat that Marcus realized how much he was shaking. He tried to clench and unclench his fists to release the tension in his body. It didn’t work very well. “How long have you known you could do things no one else could?” Jayson asked.

“A few months, I guess. At first it was things like my cell phone dying one minute, then at full power the next. You know, normal weird stuff.”

“Hm. Yeah. And then?”

“Then I found out I could do it on purpose. Turn my cell on and off just by thinking about it. Other things too. The TV. The microwave. It was cool at first, but then I realized it made me some kind of freak.”

“And so you researched it online.”

Marcus nodded. “I-I thought I’d found others. You know, people with real powers.”

“So you came to the brilliant conclusion that you needed to meet them in a dark alley in a bad neighborhood.” Drake rolled off the gurney he’d been resting on. He stretched out his muscles before the shock stiffened them completely. He gave Marcus a disapproving look.

Marcus blushed. “It wasn’t like that, okay? One of the…one of the girls I was talking to said she was in trouble. She wanted to meet. I thought…” He trailed off. No matter how he put it, it did sound colossally stupid. “They were going to kill me, weren’t they?”

“Yup.”

Dude doesn’t believe in sugarcoating things, does he? Marcus mused.

Jay cast Drake a disapproving look. “Hey, cut the kid some slack, eh?

“Kid tried to fry me. I ain’t cutting nobody nothin’.”

Jay rolled his eyes. “Don’t mind him. He’s grumpy with everyone. It’s when he starts giving you an evil grin that you gotta be worried.”

Drake gave him an evil grin.

“See, like that.”

It did make Marcus a little uncomfortable to see the man looking at him much like a predator would look at his prey. But he had other concerns. “So…who were those guys anyway?”

“Agents of Solstice,” Jay answered. “They’re a purist group that believe in the cleansing of the human race. To them, we’re an abomination.”

“Don’t feel too bad,” Drake said. “This is a common tactic of theirs.”

Don’t remind me. Marcus was becoming increasingly aware that his sister was suffering a life-threatening injury, and it was all his fault. “So…you’re just a bunch of people with super powers trying to keep each other safe?”

Jay laughed. “Oh, we’re a lot more organized than that. We’re part of something called the Delta Division. It used to be a military organization before the last leadership made it a bit more of an informal agency. It’s a total secret though. Seriously, we’ve got some paperwork to do.”

Drake groaned again and stood. “Anyway. Welcome to the madhouse. Jayson’ll give you the grand tour. I’m going to go find a bed and sleep off the effects of being used as a lightning rod.” He looked at Jay and his face turned serious. “You’ll…”

Jay nodded. “I’ll let you know if anything changes with her.”

Marcus followed Drake’s retreating back with his gaze. This was a grave situation, but that didn’t for a second disrupt the…poise of these people. They had an air of elite comrades, people who’d worked together for years under circumstances that would break a person. And one of them is my sister. He could scarcely believe it. I feel like I’m dreaming.

“So…my sister’s a super hero.”

Jay chuckled. “Damn straight. One of the best.”

“I kinda feel like half my childhood started to suddenly make sense. The other half is garbled nonsense. Like I mysteriously switched places with some unlucky jackass in a super powered spy movie.”

Jay threw back his head and laughed. “That is possibly the most accurate description of learning about all of this that I have ever heard. That’s awesome.”

Marcus crossed his arms and leaned against the back of the chair, a sullen gaze directed somewhere in the distance. “What can I say, humor is a defense mechanism.” He felt unbelievably tired all of the sudden. The adrenalin was wearing off, and all he wanted to do was curl into a ball, buried under a mountain of mindless television and Internet cat videos. Anything to drown out the day. He shut his eyes, fatigue and a bitter taste of something he couldn’t describe forcing him into an almost disassociated state. I killed three people tonight.

A heavy pressure on his shoulder brought him back to reality–or what passed for reality in this particular moment. “It’s a lot to process,” Jayson said. “Take your time. If you need to talk, I’m here. Your sister will be happy to answer any questions as well, once she’s up and running. We’ve got people here trained to handle your transition. Marcus, look at me.”

And for some reason, Marcus let his hazel eyes meet Jayson’s green ones.